The 7th General Assembly of the EU-Russia Civil Society Forum was held on 1-3 February 2017 in Helsinki, Finland. The most of the events took place at the Radisson Blu Seaside Hotel.

The major topics discussed were 100 years of civil society evolution in Finland; nationalism, conservatism, and changing borders of Europe; situation of the Russian civil society; contemporary news consumption; war memories; sustainable development and poverty reduction; future scenatios for the Baltic Sea Region. Besides, current projects and new products of the Forum - such as the "State of the Civil Society" Report - were presented to the public. Finally, side events by Forum members and site visits to local NGOs built another part of the Programme.

As usual, a special attention was paid to the work in groups and closed sessions for members on 2 and 3 February. In 2017, the Forum went through a complex transition process to an independent legal entity - as decided in a remote voting procedure by Forum members.

The General Assembly was preceded by a series of events in St. Petersburg, Russia.

To see the full Programme, please follow the link. The media release with #GAHelsinki results is available here.

The 7th General Assembly of the EU-Russia Civil Society Forum was supported by the European Commission, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland, the British Embassy in Moscow, the Robert Bosch Stiftung and the Oak Foundation. The official local partner was Kehys, the Finnish NGDO Platform to the EU. The official media partner was Deutsche Welle.